Bosch parks Bendix Brakes on the sale block; MacCap hired
A for-sale sign is up at one of Australia’s last remaining car parts manufacturers, Ballarat-based Bendix Brakes, which is half-owned by German engineering juggernaut Bosch.
Bendix Brakes has been manufacturing brake pads and the like from its Ballarat factory since 1955.
Street Talk can reveal Bendix’s owners, Bosch’s Pacifica Group and NASDAQ-listed parts maker Garrett Advancing Motion, have mandated Macquarie Capital’s bankers to drum up a new buyer for 100 per cent of the business, which was founded in 1955 to manufacture friction materials for Australia’s then-fledgling automotive industry.
Sources said Bendix now makes about $30 million in annual earnings selling automotive parts like brake pads, disc brake rotors, brake shoes, brake hose kits and electric brake controllers. It has also built product ranges for commercial vehicles, and EVs like Teslas. Most of its sales are in the aftermarket category. (It changed its official name to FMP Group (Australia) Pty Ltd 21 years ago, but still markets products under the Bendix Brakes brand name.)
It is – quite literally – the kind of nuts-and-bolts corporate carve-out that has proved to be a happy hunting ground for buyout funds, in particular, Pacific Equity Partners. Investors will recall PEP’s lucrative bet on towing and trailering products company Horizon Global’s Asia Pacific unit, which it sold to ASX-listed GUD Holdings for $744.6 million in December 2021.
Sources said a circa $300 million price tag for Bendix Brakes may be possible, based on a 10-times earnings multiple. It is not known how advanced the MacCap-led process is, however, sources suggested it was well-progressed.
The broader Bendix business traces its history back to the 1920s in the United States where it was a pioneer in automotive brakes, wartime automotive safety and then aeronautic hydraulics. General Motors was an early investor.
In 1983, Bendix was acquired by Allied Corporation, which eventually changed its name to Honeywell after buying the latter in 1999. Fast-forward to 2018 and Honeywell spun out Garrett Motion on the NASDAQ, in a deal that included the 50 per cent stake in the now up-for-grabs Bendix Brakes.
Both Honeywell and Garrett have faced asbestos-related personal injury lawsuits, which the company has attributed to its legacy Bendix friction materials business. The unit made brake linings that contained chrysotile asbestos in encapsulated form.
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